Firefox 5.0 to Launch 16 Weeks after 4.0, Firefox 6.0 Just 6 Weeks aft

[Buddahfan]

Mozilla shoots for June 21 release of Firefox 5

Full article on link

Mozilla shoots for June 21 release of Firefox 5

New faster-paced development schedule mimics Chrome's

By Gregg Keizer
April 8, 2011 04:10 PM ET

Computerworld - Mozilla has set an aggressive schedule for the next version of Firefox, slating the release of Firefox 5 for June 21. If it meets that schedule, Mozilla could crank out Firefox 6 just two months later.

Mozilla has shifted to a faster-paced development cycle where it adds new features as it goes to a series of versions -- dubbed nightly, aurora, beta and Firefox -- each of which feeds into the next-most-stable build until a polished edition is released. The change is a major shift for the open-source company, which has been locked into a much longer schedule. Firefox 4, for example, was in development for over a year, while Firefox 3.6 took about the same amount of time to finish.

Google uses a similar process to continually feed features to Chrome, relying on a four-channel line of development: nightly, dev, beta and stable. The result is a new version of Chrome every six to eight weeks. According to information posted on Mozilla's site, its new, faster development will match Google's.

Mozilla is currently planning a truncated schedule for Firefox 5, which should ship June 21. To meet that deadline, Firefox 5 has to hit the "aurora" channel April 12 and reach beta by May 17.

With Firefox 5 done, Mozilla will shift to a standard 18-week schedule that will put Firefox 6's release around mid-August.

 

[Night Hawk]

I have lost the count of how many times i've updated my FF in the last 15 months...its ridiculous to see that instead of coming up with something different all they do ""present the old stuff in a new package"" same damn old browser with few (sometimes couple) features...they should try to make it more user friendly as i didn't found the same with FF 4.0 Beta 1,2 & went back to FF 3.6.13 & i'm happy with that....

They should try to make it more light on memory(RAM), more secure, faster & graceful.

beta #10, beta #11, beta #12 and the list goes on each time you turn around. This is one of the reasons I'll prefer another browser to be second to IE. The only two upgrades were to the 3.6 now the 4.0 release just seen. Maybe in 2012 I'll look at 7.0.

If you want fast and less memory intensive firefox, I recommend you try out Palemoon, as he recently released Palemoon 4.

Gave it a whirl and added it to the browsers for Windows folder. But no big hoolah. The options were a bit easier to use however while no real difference seen at this end likely due to having a fast, reliable connection these days.

 

[lehnerus2000]

Beta Software

Everyone wants software to be perfect on the first attempt, in reality it doesn't happen.
That's why companies release betas.

If you don't want beta updates, don't use beta software.

 

[Night Hawk]

Even final versions have bugs at times just as well as any beta release. When adding the Pale Moon variation of FF on here everything suddenly locked up solid. But this is also why the better supported softwares tend to see more frequent updates to address various problems that can come up.

 

[biggles1000]

It's probably just a play on version numbers. Like Google Chrome, they want to increase numbers as fast as possible. I doubt there will be any significant differences between these versions.

yeah, totally agree with the chrome bit. i mean, what are they on now? something crazy like 11... it took Opera many years to choose to be 11 and IE is only on 9 ATM. Google need to have a real think about their version numbering. Anyway, let's hope firefox 5 is an even faster and more solid browser

 

[neo101]

I upgraded to Firefox 4 and half of my add-ons including my theme are not updated, almost a week later since FireFox 4 release. You'd think since FireFox 4 was in RC stages for month the developers of these addons and themes would have been working on making it ready, atleast 3 days after official launch. FireFox default theme looks horrible and I despise that the loading of content is text in the lower right hand corner, I can't even turn it off. I won't go back to 3.6 because I've managed to get 4.0 to have a new flow for me but I'll continue to grip until my previous add-ons are updated including theme. I'm going to give the developers one more week until I begin emailing their ass.

Dear JerometheGiraff,
It is a fact that many add-ons and extensions have not been up to par with FF4! The beauty and the attraction of FF were partly(if not mainly) the add-ons! I miss the color tabs and a few more security add-ons!
Regards,
Sreedhav

... I'm going to give the developers one more week until I begin emailing their ass.

This is one of the funniest post I've seen here! :roflmao::roflmao::roflmao:
Let's see: free browser, free themes, free add-ons, and you think they care 'bout you complaining in email... Nothing personal, but let us know how this works out for you.

Regards-

agree most of those emails will go straight into the trash. now add mr tech toolkit(for some compatibility issues), nightly tester tools(for some compatiblity issues), add colorful tabs(for your colorful tabs).

That's the kind of arrogance that Trashed Microsoft's income stream and rep for years! (dealing with the mess and non-drivers for Vista)

FurFix sells itself on it's "add-ons" - so they have a duty to keep them coming! :shock:

Version 4 is a complete vixen for me so went back to stable 3.16

 

[Tepid]

That's the kind of arrogance that Trashed Microsoft's income stream and rep for years! (dealing with the mess and non-drivers for Vista)

Are you talking about removing a lot of backward compatibility (a.k.a Bloat) and closing security holes that existed in XP, which broke improperly written drivers and apps?

 

[zEric7x]

In less higher version numbers means big changes and improvements I dont really notice. If they want people to like the number just call next release 9000 or something. Then I can say Firefox is over 9000 and IE is not. LOL just had to make that joke. But anyways IL wait and see what they release.

 

[Ciara]

I don't use FF but I think I would soon get fed up with keep changing versions

 

[Night Hawk]

I generally don't here either while still having it on as a spare? I gave Opera the edge over FF some time back! But even that is still second to IE.

Most of the time the next release is still a beta not final since FF goes through several with each number. If it's not your primary preferred browser you simply end up waiting until the final is out and by then see a beta for the next! It's a catch 22 with "sink and lure".

 

[Commodore Pet]

They are finally updating 64 bit Minefield again. With a new look.

 

[linux731]

Bleah I don't trust Softpedia.

 

[stormy13]

Bleah I don't trust Softpedia.

Just get it here,

Firefox Nightly Builds

 

[sandeep108]

Love v4, great work guys. The blurry font rendering is due to hardware acceleration enabled by default in Firefox 4 and is due to a problem with Microsoft's DirectWrite API. Till they get this fixed, I suggest GDI only for Firefox (turn HWA off). IE9 does not use DirectWrite for fonts so it looks better.

It is a very neat and clean look and extremely customisable. The pinned tabs feature is also very nice. And page loading is much quicker than v3. Most of my add-ons are now compatible within a couple of weeks, which is fine by me.

 

[Zirro]

New 64-bit Build Out

64-bit build has now been updated on Nightly Builds.

I am impressed how stable the 64-bit build is. Its now my preferred browser.

 

[winsupertweaker]

Bleah I don't trust Softpedia.

Nor I. 90% of what I download is from Cnet.com .

 

[Buddahfan]

New Channels for Firefox Rapid Releases

New Channels for Firefox Rapid Releases

Posted by dsicore
April 13th, 2011 · Firefox, Mozilla News

Following the amazing release of Firefox 4, Mozilla Firefox is moving to a rapid release development cycle to deliver new features, performance enhancements and security updates and stability improvements to users faster.

Until now, there were three channels to test new features in Firefox:

• Nightly Test Builds – Includes features not tested by Mozilla QA
• Firefox Betas – Broadly test the stability of new features and improvements in the next version of Firefox
• Firefox Final Releases – Delivers the polished and stable features in Firefox to hundreds of millions of users

We are making a change to deliver new releases of Firefox faster and give users more opportunities to participate in building Firefox.

Today, we launch the Aurora channel as part of a broader initiative to create channels which deliver features to users at various levels of quality and polish. The Aurora channel is where users can test the latest features and innovations. Users can expect an increase in polish from the raw, cutting edge features in our nightly builds. Aurora releases may not be as stable as beta or final releases.

This first Aurora release includes performance, security and stability improvements.

Aurora releases may not be as stable as beta or final releases. To that end this first Aurora release includes..... stability improvements.
More on link

 

[Commodore Pet]

It seems like 4.2a1pre is the only version with 64 bit support, so far nothing posted for version 5 or 6 on their website. At least not yet.

 

[Commodore Pet]

I stand corrected. I just did an update and I am now at 6.0a1.

 

[Night Hawk]

I can wait until a final version of one version or another is seen. Being that FF is a 3rd 3rd party browser It will wait!